March
7th 2011 ....I have been working with Toby today on a new exercise called "Touch
y' Back". He has to lean back, curling his long neck, and rest his chin
on his spine. It is a seated exercise. I have been combining the exercise with
the also-seated Shuffle to see if he would get confused, the cues being somewhat
similar. Mostly he's fine.

SHUFFLING

This
is another fun exercise.The shuffle is what llamas do after they've
kushed and want to rearrange their bent legs for comfort. To get them
to shuffle again, after all this rearrangement has been done, is fairly
easy. I use a clicker for this one. On the understanding that"
what you click is what you get"..I capture (click/reward) the
shuffle as it is done naturally, a few times and then
add a verbal cue and a hand signal. There is a point, however, where
the front and back legs get so far apart that the llama gets "all
shuffled out" !!

Theshuffle can be
seen as part of the combined movements Oscar does in this clip: